A new issue of OnEarth is out. SpearIt (SLU): Why Obama is Black: Language, Law and Structures of Power. From Infoshop, Chris Knight on Noam Chomsky: Politics or science? The Drowning Child: Jeremy Stangroom has put together a new interactive activity that’s based on Peter Singer’s “Famine, Affluence & Morality”. The pathos of the plutocrat: The very rich don’t just have more money — they expect a level of deference the Average Joe never experiences, and that has become a major factor in America’s politics. The answer a lot of philosophers give to “You didn’t build that!” is, “All right, so what?” — which is perhaps why, in general, politicians don’t spend a lot of time listening to philosophers. Cultural struggles: Duncan McEachern Yoon is for an alternative modernity based on transnational solidarity and an affirmation of a non-exploitative global consciousness.

From H-Net, a review of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam in the Course of History: Exchange and Conflicts. Must civilizations clash? Barry Gewen reviewsJust and Unjust Peace: An Ethic of Political Reconciliation by Daniel Philpott. From National Catholic Register, “true Christianity is a persecuted Christianity”: An interview with Archbishop Bashar Matti Warda of the Chaldean Catholic Archdiocese of Erbil in northern Iraq. From Christian Century, the clash that wasn’t: Somehow, newspapers never publish banner headlines announcing "World's Largest Muslim State Fails to Persecute Christians"; and whose holy ground? If a given sacred site was once pagan, then Christian, then Muslim, then again Christian, the most painless solution would seem to be to accept present realities. From Changing Lenses, an article on Muslims in a “Judeo-Christian culture”. An interview with Robert F. Shedinger, author of Was Jesus a Muslim?: Questioning Categories in the Study of Religion. Entitled Christian Syndrome: Singing “Our God Is Greater” might make God seem less great.